


Home for the Holidays

by butimaloneandfree



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: Angst, Christmas, Christmas Angst, I don't know where it's going either, and ended with some hard core theology, christianity from an outside perspective tho, it started with how does Kara feel about christmas, no plot just angst, not at alll evangelical i wouldn't do that to you, tw: religion
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-23
Updated: 2020-12-23
Packaged: 2021-03-11 02:28:48
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,220
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28267647
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/butimaloneandfree/pseuds/butimaloneandfree
Summary: "Kara tried not to calculate how fast her prayers would have to travel to reach Rao, all those light years away."--Kara wants to love the holidays, but she has just a little too much trauma to do so.
Relationships: Alex Danvers & Kara Danvers
Kudos: 15





	Home for the Holidays

There were pieces of the holidays that Kara loved. She loved the lights and the food and the days off. She loved cheesy Christmas musical specials that no one could complain about because it was Christmas and that was what you were supposed to do on Christmas.

Then there were parts of the holidays that Kara wanted to love. She loved the idea of being with family. She even sometimes enjoyed the time with the Danvers; but she felt the hole of her own parents, and then they all felt the hole Jeremiah left behind.

It was as though most of the country put aside their individuality for a few weeks, all their complications and messiness, to dress the same, act the same, make the same cookies, perform the same rituals, and watch the same movies. And no matter how she acted, she’d never be one of them.

It was everywhere; the reminders. “I’ll be home for Christmas” never sat right with her; home wasn’t a place she could go, or even imagine celebrating such a foreign holiday. Christmas cards reminded her she didn’t have parents to put her on a card (the Danvers didn’t send one out for security reasons; it felt like tempting fate).

The religion of it felt strange; celebrating the birth of someone doomed to become a martyr, who was somehow also a God. Rao had never needed such pageantry or theatrics; Rao was constant and tangible, his light guided their days and his warmth stayed through the night. She didn’t like to think of that either; if she thought too hard about it, her mind began to wander. _Does Rao still watch over the space where Krypton used to be?_ A little voice in the back of her head wondered. _If Rao wouldn’t save Krypton, why would he hear your prayers?_

Kara forced the questions out of her head; the last remaining Kryptonian could not afford to question Rao. She could not afford to give in to heresy. There was no one left to give her answers. She alone had to guide herself back if her faith started to slip. She prayed prayers that she’d memorized as a child. She recited them fast and thoughtlessly, trying to outrun the thoughts racing through her head, until they were nothing but words in a dead language, an empty ritual of a religion barely clinging to life.

Kara tried not to calculate how fast her prayers would have to travel to reach Rao, all those light years away.

When Kara woke up after her fight with Reign to find she’d been in a coma for three days, she was almost relieved. She’d missed Christmas and all its messy emotions. The relief lasted for all of thirty seconds until she realized she’d also ruined Christmas for all her friends and family. Then she just felt guilty for her relief, and guilty for the coma in the first place.

Lena, Kara was happy to remember, had been kept completely in the dark about it, and had probably enjoyed her holiday as well as expected, even if that meant

Thankfully, Kara didn’t have time to dwell on that. There was a battle raging outside, and a killer to defeat. Head still pounding, muscles stiff from the beating and the coma, Kara launched herself into the fight.

After the fight, of course, there was the DEO debrief for _both_ Reign battles, and then a checkup that Alex insisted on. Kara had been about to fight her on it, about to insist that she was _fine_ and was not letting anything else stand between her and sister night, until she looked at Alex, really _looked_ at her for the first time since waking up. The barely-bottled panic in them stung.

Kara suffered dutifully through the checkup and went home with Alex after that. She sat there, on the sofa, joking with Alex and brushing off all her concerns because if Kara dwelled, she’d break.

She stayed long enough that Alex’s hands stopped tapping on the sofa and her heart slowed to a pace that was truly calm. Kara understood the pain; when Alex had been kidnapped it was the longest twelve hours of her life. Alex had sat through three days of that. Three days this time, actually. Plus another day with the black mercy, a few hours with the time they fished her out of the ocean… honestly it was getting to be hard to keep track of.

Kara had always known her sister worried. But until she was in Alex’s shoes, helpless and starring down the worst possibility, she hadn’t understood what that meant. Kidnapping, torture, comas…none of them were fun. But she would have taken any of that in a heartbeat over helplessness.

Kara could save the world, but nothing would save Alex from the pain of watching her do it. So instead, she held her sister tight and told her everything was fine and always would be fine, until both of them started to believe it.

So, it was around six hours after coming out of a coma that she finally stumbled into her apartment. The exhaustion of the past three days was catching up to her. She opened the door to her apartment and stood there, breathing in the stale air. Someone had cleaned since their interrupted party, at least put the food away, so no rotting pastries sat on the counter. Her Christmas decorations were still up. Presents under the tree, like a time capsule.

If she had died, she wondered, how long would the decorations have stayed up? Would Alex have unwrapped the presents eventually, or donated them to charity sight unseen?

The star atop her tree twinkled in the darkness, reflecting the light of the streetlamp outside.

She’d always loved that about Christmas. A star, guiding the devoted followers to both the literal and metaphorical light. It felt familiar. Rao, from here, was just a far away star too. And yet, if a star could guide the wise men, then Rao could guide her too. And yet, this time it bugged her.

After nearly dying, the martyrdom of Christmas hit a little different. Hit more like a truck than a cute story.

People worshipped her now. Not in a narcissistic way, like she’d once declared under the influence of red kryptonite. They literally worshipped her. There was an entire cult who thought being more than human made her more than a person. They thought she was their salvation. Just like they worshipped this god who was once an innocent baby, destined to die saving them. Had he known? He’d been willing to die, Kara had figured out that much about Easter, but had he wanted to? Had there really been no other way?

_Why did these people need a martyr to save them?_ Kara wondered, as she caught her breath against the counter. _Why did it feel like they were waiting for her to die too?_

“You look so beautiful with the weight of all these worlds on your shoulders” Mon-El had told her once. The comment haunted her, even now. She didn’t want the price of that beauty, had never asked for it, and yet it had been thrust upon her anyway.

She didn’t even put her pajamas on before climbing into bed.

**Author's Note:**

> Please comment thoughts on where this should go if you're so inclined; it doesn't feel finished but I also have no idea what to do with it.


End file.
